


Vou amar-te em Braille

by forochel



Category: Eu não quero voltar sozinho | I Don't Want to Go Back Alone (2010)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2013-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-05 13:25:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1094369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forochel/pseuds/forochel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What happens the day after Gabriel kisses Leo.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Vou amar-te em Braille

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pasdexcuses](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pasdexcuses/gifts).



> dear pasdexcuses, 
> 
> god your prompt for this was so fabulous and basically everything _I_ wanted to know about their story too, so thank you for the chance to write about it! I do hope you have had a lovely christmas, and that you like this little story! 
> 
> the title is taken from jose carlos limeira's poem [Mágica](http://qarrtsiluni.com/2011/03/03/love-and-light-in-brazil-two-poems-by-jose-carlos-limeira/).

Leo walks by himself to across the road from the yellow house, counting his steps carefully. Giovana left the previous afternoon not having managed to get anything out of him. 

"You're not here right now," she huffed at him, before her lips brushed against his cheek. “We’re still friends, okay? I’ll see you tomorrow morning." 

He spent the rest of the day in a daze, lying on his window seat and listening to his iPod, daydreaming of that gentle press of lips against his own. How close Gabriel must have been to him, the scent of him in the soft material of his sweater, the give of his skinny arm under Leo's grip when Gabriel walks him home.

Now, his heart stutters along with the clip of his stick against the pavement in front of him. 

He hears Giovana’s running footsteps before she cries, "Leo!" and holds his arm pre-emptively out for her. She takes it and rattles on, “So are you back with the living now? What happened to you yesterday? You were so out of it.”

“Hello, Gigi,” Leo says with a little laugh. 

She nudges him in the side. “Yes, good morning, when did you become Mister Manners? What _happened_?”

"I don't know," Leo says, a little dreamily. "I think Gabriel came before you, yesterday, and I said everything. I thought he was you. I told him you'd eaten the dessert."

Giovana gasps, and her grip on his arm tightens. "And? And what happened?"

Leo pauses. He's replayed what happened in his mind at least a hundred times. "He kissed me. And then he left."

"Oh my _god_ ," Giovana says, and they start walking again. “What are you going to do in school?”

Something tightens low in his gut, and Leo feels a little nauseous. “I don’t know. What should I do? What do you do?” 

“I usually tell you when I like someone, silly,” Giovana says. “And then I don’t do anything about it.” There’s a funny note to her voice that recalls Gabriel’s suspicions, but she’s warm and relaxed against Leo’s side, and her fingers aren’t tense. 

“That’s not very useful advice, Gigi,” Leo tells her.

“Well, you’re not me,” Giovana retorts. “Just do whatever you feel like when — oh.”

“Oh?” Leo asks. 

“Hi, Gabriel,” Giovana says, and now she _definitely_ sounds funny. Leo tilts his head towards her voice in worry. 

“Ah,” comes Gabriel’s deep drawl. “Hi, Giovana.” It might just be Leo’s imagination, but he thinks maybe Gabriel might be standing awkwardly. And that he might sound even more nervous when he says, “Leo.”

“Hi, Gabriel,” Leo says, and shifts uneasily on his feet.

He feels Giovana’s fingers tighten and then let go suddenly. Before he can make a noise, she says, “Ah! I see Larissa up ahead, I think she wants to talk about the history assignment. I’m just going to ... go, okay? Okay. Bye!” 

Gabriel laughs a little, sounding slightly shocked. “She is a funny one.”

“Yeah,” Leo says, and reaches out instinctively for Gabriel’s arm. He half expects to reach nothing, but then he feels the soft fabric of Gabriel’s sweater under his fingers and Gabriel’s arm under that, and smiles. “You got your sweater back,” he ventures. 

“I did,” Gabriel confirms, and pauses. “Um.” 

“There’s some time before the first class, I think,” says Leo, taking pity. 

“Twenty minutes.”

“Let’s go for a walk. The fountain,” Leo suggests. “I like to listen to the water chimes.”

“Sure,” Gabriel says, and starts steering them to the fountain next to the theatre wing. 

Leo doesn’t let go of Gabriel’s arm when they’re seated on the wide marble ledge around the fountain, and slides his hand down to clasp fingers with Gabriel. The wobbly seed of conviction that took root when Gabriel kissed him yesterday strengthens when Leo hears his little gasp. 

“I didn’t mind it, you know.” 

“What?” Gabriel asks, because he’s _stupid_. 

“When you kissed me,” says Leo patiently. “I liked it. I just wished you’d stayed. I thought you were Gi!” 

“I told you she liked you,” Gabriel says, seizing upon the least relevant thing. Least relevant to Leo right now, anyway. 

“Well, it was you.” 

“Ah,” Gabriel says, and strokes his thumb over the back of Leo’s hand. “Yeah. I’m sorry I left ... but I didn’t know what to say. I was happy?”

“You were so happy you ran away?”

“I was so happy I kissed you! And then I ran away. No! I didn’t run away.”

“No?” asks Leo, laughing. 

Gabriel laughs too. “No, it was a momentary retreat. To regroup. I wasn’t thinking at all.”

“All right then,” says Leo, smiling so hard his face hurt. “Do you —”

He’s cut off by the warning bell, and Gabriel pulls them to their feet. “Oops,” he says. “We should go now.”

As they’re walking to the lift, Gabriel asks, “Do I what?”

“Oh,” says Leo. “I wanted to ask if you wanted to ... go somewhere else after school today.”

“Like on a date?” Gabriel’s voice is warm. 

Leo smiles, “Yeah.”

*

At recess, Gabriel has to go off to see Bhaskara about something to do with maths. He laughs when Leo makes a face and says “ _Bhaskara_ ” in tones of disdain, and promises to come back alive.

“Well, you’re already flirting like an old couple,” Giovana tells him. “I think Karina’s going to go cry into her ice cream now.”

“I’m sorry,” Leo says, but he’s smiling.

“Ugh!” exclaims Giovana, and pulls him down to sit with her on the floor. “You’re disgustingly happy.” 

The funny note is back in her voice, and it sobers Leo up. A little bit. “I’m sorry,” he says properly. “I didn’t mean to ... I. Am I hurting you, Gigi?”

What follows is a disconcertingly long silence. Then Giovana laughs a little tremulously, “No, silly. I’m just happy to see you’re happy.” 

Leo furrows his eyebrows, and scoots closer to hug her. “I’m sorry anyway,” he says into her hair as she dampens his collar a little with tears.

“I’ll kill you if you tell anyone,” she says, muffled. 

“Who would I tell?” Leo says, peaceably. They’ve known each other since they were 9, and he’s got faith in their friendship. He pauses. “It was Gabriel who ratted you out to me, though.”

Giovana makes a frustrated noise and sat up, her head whispering past Leo’s nose. “Sometimes I wish I hadn’t invited him to walk back with us!”

Leo feels inexplicably hurt. “But — Gi —”

“I mean it!” Giovana says, with a smack as her hand hit the floor between them. “It’s all changing now and I don’t — I don’t know.”

“I -- don’t you like him?” Leo asks, floundering. 

She snorts. “I do, but I don’t. But better him than Katrina, I suppose.” 

“...Okay,” Leo says, feeling slightly confused. “You’re still my best friend, though, Gi.” 

“Good,” Giovana says vehemently, and there’s a honking sound as she blows her nose. “Don’t you forget that. Or I’ll set my aunts on you.” 

Leo feels his eyes widen in horror. “Jesus, no. And I wouldn’t. Forget, I mean.” 

“Good,” she says. “Now where’s your boyfriend?”

“Probably being eaten alive by Bhaskara,” Leo predicts gloomily, but can’t help the warmth blossoming in his chest.

“Bhaskara loves him,” Giovana says, and stands up as the 5 minute bell went. “She’ll probably try to steal him from you.”

“I’ll quadratic her if she does,” Leo says.

Giovana laughs, and the sounds of it makes Leo smile. “What does that even mean?”

“I don’t know,” Leo whispers as they jostle their way through the returning crowd to their seats. “But I’ll work it out.”

Gabriel slips back into his seat just before the start of their history lesson, hand brushing momentarily against Leo’s shoulder. 

“Well,” their teacher says drily, “Now that Mr Florian has decided to grace us with his presence, we can continue with the Classical period.”

*

It’s only when the last bell goes that Leo realises he forgot to tell Giovana that he and Gabriel were going on a date. 

“Gi,” he leans over and hisses under the cover of a noisy classroom packing up to leave. “I didn’t have time to tell you earlier, but I hope you don’t mind Gabriel and I are going out after this.”

“What?” Her voice goes higher. “Like on a date?”

“Exactly like that,” he says, and blushes.

She harrumphs. “Okay, but I’m coming over afterwards to ask you all about it.” 

Leo thinks about protesting for about a second before giving up. “Okay.”

They lean away from each other when Gabriel asks, “Ready to go?”

“Yeah,” Leo says with a hiccup of nervousness, and gets to his feet.

“Well, you guys have fun,” Giovana says, and her chair scrapes behind her. 

Gabriel clears his throat awkwardly. “Is she okay?”

“Yes,” Leo says, and finds that he doesn’t really want to go into it yet. “Shall we go?”

“Sure,” Gabriel takes his arm. They walk in companionable silence, and pause outside the school gates. “Where do you want to go?”

“Ah...”

“There’s a free matinee concert at the MIS,” Gabriel suggests. “And a straight bus to Pinheiros from here.”

Leo smiles. “Sounds good.” 

They’re sitting in the bus shelter, waiting for the bus, when Leo asks, “How did you know about the concert?”

There’s a rustling as Gabriel fidgets next to him, and the sound of him zipping and unzipping his sweater. “I was bored one day at home and was surfing the internet ... you know how it is.”

“Sure,” says Leo, warming, and leans over impulsively to kiss Gabriel on the cheek. He misses a little bit, or maybe Gabriel turned his head, because their lips end up sliding together, it feels like a jolt has just shivered its way down Leo’s spine. He’s raising a hand to touch Gabriel’s face when someone wolf-whistles at them from far away, and they jerk apart.

His face feels like it’s burning. Gabriel takes his hand and presses his lips to Leo’s knuckles, murmuring, “Bastards. Ignore them.” 

They’re still holding hands when the bus pulls up and stops for them to board. 

*

Gabriel shakes him awake when they reach the museum bus stop. 

“Mmf, sorry,” Leo stumbles to his feet. “My mother used to take me on buses when I was a baby and refused to fall asleep. It’s just like a ...”

“A lullaby?” Gabriel asks. He sounds very fond, and Leo wishes very suddenly and very hard that he could _see_ what Gabriel looks like, right now. 

Gabriel stops walking, and Leo almost falls over; Gabriel steadies him. “Hey, what’s wrong? You made a face?”

“Nothing,” Leo says, and starts walking purposefully in the same direction they were going, pulling Gabriel along with the hand on his arm.. 

“...Okay.” Gabriel sounds unconvinced. “Well, we’re going to the studio. Mamparra are playing.”

“Who?” asks Leo.

“I don’t know either,” Gabriel says. Leo thinks he might have shrugged, the way his arm went up and down. “But I hope it’ll be a nice surprise.”

Mamparra turns out to be _amazing_ , and also a band. Their opening song, _tava na cara_ , is drawled sing-speaking dialogue between the lead singers over funky guitar lines and a steady cymbal beat that have Leo bopping in his seat, and then confused by the sheer experimental _weirdness_ of the bridges. It’s amazing, and he tells Gabriel so in a whisper. _Hobbinho_ is much less confusing, and easier to dance in his chair along too; he doesn’t really care if he’s making a fool of himself, mostly because the lady singer’s just shouted encouragement for everyone to dance, and also because Gabriel’s laughing quietly next to him. 

“Are you dancing?” Leo demands breathlessly during the samba, feeling for Gabriel’s hand. “She said to dance.”

“I’m watching you dance,” Gabriel says, and suddenly sounds very close when he says, “And I’m thinking about kissing you.”

Everything crashes to a halt around them, it feels like. Or like everything’s just faded into background noise. “It’s pretty dark in here,” Gabriel adds thoughtfully. “And we’re near the back.”

Leo tilts his head. “Did you do that on purpose?”

“Maybe,” Gabriel says, and Leo can feel him grinning into their kiss. 

They don’t get kicked out of the studio, but after the concert, when they're waiting at the bus stop, Gabriel tells him that the ushers were giving them the stink-eye as they left.

“Oops,” Leo says, too light-headed to feel guilty. “Not so dark as you thought it was, then.”

“Haha,” says Gabriel, and steals another kiss.

The bus arrives, then, and the driver beeps gently at them. It turns out to be the same one who drove them here, and they greet her with great cheer. As the bus rolls onward home, they sit pressed together, shoulder to hip to thigh. Gabriel traces random shapes into the palm of his hand and Leo only realises after a while that Gabriel's tracing _Braille_ ; his spelling is clumsy and hesitant, but his intent is clear. Leo closes his eyes, happy and content, thinking sleepily of all that he has to tell Giovana.

**Author's Note:**

> the MIS is [an actual place](http://mis-sp.org.br/) and looks SUPER COOL. mamparra is also [an actual band](https://myspace.com/mamparra/music/songs), and I really like all 4 songs of theirs that are online.


End file.
